


Touch

by miera



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/M, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-06
Updated: 2011-04-06
Packaged: 2017-10-17 16:05:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/178557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miera/pseuds/miera
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes words just won't do the trick</p>
            </blockquote>





	Touch

Elizabeth let the wheelchair roll to a stop as she reached the intersection of the two corridors. She was debating circling around one more time, even though her arms were aching from tiredness. She welcomed the ache, though. It distracted her from the throbbing in the leg encased in the heavy cast. Hopefully she'd tired herself out sufficiently to get some real sleep tonight.

Ronon walked into the hallway before she could come to a decision. He paused, looking her over, his eyes taking in the sweat on her forehead and the way she was breathing. He didn't say anything, but his eyebrows went up.

"I was restless," she said, a little defensively.

"It's late," he said, walking behind her and beginning to push the wheelchair towards her quarters without asking.

Elizabeth gave in and folded her hands in her lap. She was very tired, and she probably should try to get some sleep.

They didn't pass anyone in the halls because, as he'd said, it was late. "Why are you still up?" she asked, more to make conversation than anything else.

"I don't sleep much. Not a lot at a time," he amended. It was a sign of how long Ronon had been among them, and how much more comfortable he'd grown, that he added even that small extra detail voluntarily.

They arrived in her quarters and he looked at her critically again. "Do you want to wash before you go to sleep?"

Elizabeth's heart began to race and she fought not to blush, although she was sure he hadn't meant what her imagination had leapt to. Ronon grinned at her a little, which just irritated her further. She hated that he could trip her up like that and ever since he'd realized he had the power to fluster her, he seemed to go out of his way to do it as often as possible. "I can manage," she told him a little petulantly. She could handle cleaning herself up with a washcloth on her own. One of the nurses came by every morning to help her actually bathe and keep the full cast on her leg from getting wet, but she'd had to learn to wipe herself off without help weeks ago.

The problem was maneuvering into the bathroom in the wheelchair. Her arms were already shaky from overworking them wheeling herself around the city for an hour. Getting out of and back into the wheelchair was going to be a bitch.

Ronon hadn't left yet. In fact, he was looking from her to the bathroom, deep in thought. He stepped forward suddenly and scooped her up in his arms. Elizabeth let out a breathless squeak of surprise, her arms going around his neck out of instinct, and she felt the laugh in his chest against her side. He was smirking at her again, too, damn him.

He carried her into the bathroom and set her down on the Ancient equivalent of the toilet. "What do you need?"

She sighed, but this would go faster with some help. She pointed out where things were stored, and Ronon soaked a washcloth in hot water and handed it to her, then gave her a towel and brought her clean pajamas. Setting the clothes onto the counter, she tried to dismiss him, tell him she could handle it from here.

"I'll wait," was all he said, going back into her room. The door closed behind him.

She'd had two weeks to practice, so the actual cleaning and changing clothes didn't take long, though as usual getting her underwear on over the full length cast required some bizarrely dexterous maneuvers. She did feel better once she was in her clean t-shirt and boxer shorts, though the moving around had only increased the pain in her leg. She managed to inch her way across the bathroom on one leg, leaning on the counter, until the door opened to show Ronon lurking near her desk, waiting for her.

He crossed the room in barely two steps and lifted her off her feet again before she could say anything. Instead of moving, though, he frowned down at her in the light coming from inside the bathroom. "You look pale."

Elizabeth bit her lip. "My leg hurts," she admitted.

"Did Beckett give you something to take?"

She nodded. "The bottle's next to the bed."

He carried her over and set her down and brought her a fresh glass of water. The painkillers Carson had given her only dulled the edges of the pain without eradicating it entirely. But it had been some hours since she'd taken the last pill, and it might help her sleep.

Before she could say thank you and let Ronon leave, he sat down in the chair next to her bed, elbows on his knees. "How come you were out so late?"

This was precisely why she hadn't wanted to run into anyone. She didn't want to talk about the explosion, or the ceiling caving in on her, or the three fractures in her leg that would keep her trapped in the wheelchair for at least another two weeks. Rodney and Radek still looked miserably guilty every time they saw the wheelchair, even though it had been a freak accident. John was way too happy to be waiting on her hand and foot during the day, even though she assured him there was nothing he could have done to prevent her being in the absolute wrong spot at the worst time. They'd gotten her out from under the rubble as quickly as humanly possible. Carson had been right there to treat her. Everything had been done that could be done. She'd told them all that time and again.

The only thing left to do was wait for her to heal. And she wasn't going to add to their pointless guilt if she could help it.

But Ronon wasn't one of them, and her frustration was boiling over.

"My leg hurts," Elizabeth repeated. She looked down at the cast, feeling the itchy skin and the lingering ache deep within the muscle and bone. She drew in a breath and blurted out the rest. "I know that means the bones are healing and it's a good thing, but sometimes, especially at night when I have nothing else to think about, all I can think about is the pain and I feel like I'm going to go crazy if I don't get away from it. I can't sleep, I can't think about anything else, I just feel completely trapped."

She winced when she stopped speaking. She'd always feared that Ronon saw her as fundamentally weak. Confessing something like this could only hurt if that was his opinion of her. She glanced at him, worried, but he was eyeing her speculatively. Then he pulled off his boots. Confused, she just sat there until he stood up.

"Move up," he waved for her to shift farther down the bed. She complied without thinking about it. Then he settled himself between her and the headboard, the inside of his thigh pressed against her hip. One long leg stretched out alongside her cast, and his hands suddenly brushed over her hair, making her gasp.

"Ronon, what-?"

"Shhh," he murmured quietly into her ear. "Relax." His fingers stroked against her scalp slowly and she shivered. "Don't think about anything but the touch. Concentrate on it, and not on the pain."

The voice of reason in her head pointed out that this wasn't exactly appropriate behavior, lying in her bed in nothing but her pajamas while a member of her team was cuddled up against her and putting his hands on her body in such an intimate manner. But his touch felt wonderful, making the pain in her leg fade to a distant sensation. It warmed and calmed her. It wasn't precisely an innocent touch, but it was wholly uncalculated at the same time, and Elizabeth couldn't hold herself back from him.

He soothed her scalp gently, stroking and rubbing at the pressure points along her skull, then she felt his fingers tangle in her curls and work along the ridge behind her ears. His fingers were strong and hot against her skin and she melted a little bit more every time he found a tense spot and worked it until she relaxed further.

Her neck, her shoulders, he massaged each area in turn. When his thumbs dug into the triangular points above her shoulder blades where all of the tension in her body had always gathered, Elizabeth whimpered, unable to contain it. She thought she heard him chuckle under his breath.

His hands moved down, loosening her shoulders and the sides of her back. His fingers edged close to her breasts once or twice and Elizabeth was grateful her back was to him so he wouldn’t' see her blush. He traced each indentation of her spine, and she was having trouble staying upright by the time he reached the small of her back. She folded her arms on her knees and leaned forward. The move hiked her thin t-shirt up and his hands dropped past the hem to touch her bare skin. His thumbs rubbed at her tailbone, the rest of his fingers splayed across the curve above her ass. Despite how relaxed she felt, the contact sent a surge of heat through her, like a mild electric shock, and her mind, too blissed out from his massage to be restrained, presented her with tantalizing thoughts of feeling that sure, strong touch elsewhere on her body.

She knew her face was bright red by now, but she moaned softly with pleasure when his hands ran up and down her back under the t-shirt a few times. She didn't - couldn't - resist when he took her shoulders and pulled her upright.

He arranged her body so that she was resting against his chest, her head on his shoulder. His legs were now on both sides of her and he was so warm and incredibly comfortable. Even the sound of his breathing was soothing, and her eyes kept closing until she couldn't force them open anymore. "Still with me?" he asked very quietly. She could only hum in response as his hands glided down her arms.

He massaged her sore arms gently before reaching her hands. Elizabeth dimly remembered a friend in grad school showing her how to massage the hand properly, an important trick for anyone who had to write or type as much as they did. Ronon worked each of her hands in turn, stroking firmly between the bones and rubbing along her wrists and her fingers carefully.

When he finished he folded her hands over her abdomen, his own arms resting on top of hers. Elizabeth thought she felt his lips against her temple, but she wasn't entirely sure. She turned towards him, intending to ask something or say something even though her eyes stayed closed, but his arms tightened. "Go to sleep."

"Thank you," she managed to whisper before snuggling into him absently and falling into contented oblivion.


End file.
